The "Good" AMVs on this website

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Postby OtakuMan22 » Thu Jul 14, 2005 3:38 pm

They really need an Edit button around here.

Anyway, the thing with Samurai X and Rurouni Kenshin is that Samurai X was simply some shmancy name that some anime marketing person thought would push more copies. Samurai X is still Rurouni Kenshin, just an OAV prequel to Kenshin.

The notion here is that Kenshin went from bloodthirsty, misguided killer, to someone who puts on a mask of happiness in order to be able to enjoy the simpler and more enjoyable things in life. He fakes it so he can be happy again.

The idea is that in the Kenshin TV series, there is a dark side to Kenshin that many are not familiar with, especially the characters near Kenshin like Yahiko, Sano, and Kaoru. The Kenshin OAV gave people a look inside Kenshin's past to see what was in his head, and how he became the Battousai to begin with.

But that's going into too much detail and I think I'm ranting away from the point. To be honest, I've found a number of "Samurai X" vids as well as Kenshin vids. Kenshin is a good source of anime footage because the series is so long at more than 100 episodes. That's a lot of good action and plot footage for vids. The OAV, while not as long, still has some good stuff going for it, and I recall a good vid of it to "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" which fit pretty well.

The more source footage there is, the easier it is to make AMVs. That's a good reason why DBZ, Sailor Moon, Naruto, Kenshin, and the others have so many AMVs. The source footage is so abundant, that people think they can do anything and make it work in an AMV. NOT TRUE! The opposite is in fact true, because to make a good AMV with a series with so much footage, picking the RIGHT clip for the RIGHT section of the music is VERY difficult. With so much to choose from, getting the best match requires LOTS and LOTS of reviewing the different suitable pieces of footage, and then tying it all together into a coherent theme.

It's tricky to get this right, but with time and effort, it can be done. The problem is in the popularity of it that brings in people who don't want to put in that time and effort, and that leads to crummy videos.

The most amazing thing that can happen to an AMV is when it turns out good BY ACCIDENT! I call upon the video of Record of Lodoss War TV to Monty Python's "Camelot" song. This vid was made in less than 2 weeks if I remember correctly, and the person did it "for fun" because the thought it'd be a funny idea.

Well it turns that the funny idea was funny enough, that it propelled the vid forward into infamy, and is still one of my favorite short, but sweet, funny videos. Even though the time they put in was minimal, and effort was not as strong as usual, it was STILL really good! And that surprised the AMV creator too! :)

More talent in the world of AMVs isn't a bad thing, but the sheer LACK of talent that we can see is really becoming annoying. That's what the people who have a good head on their shoulders...

(For example, someone who knows their AMVs, but can't make them, does not make that person unable to tell a good AMV from a bad one, and what it is about it that makes them think and feel this way. It's the same way critics are with movies. They don't make them, but they can pinpoint the flaws and good points from their position outside of the movie's production)

... and the AMV creators who have a great track record of good AMVs need to help out the youthful aspirationalists and try and get them to understand what makes a video good, how it can be made original, and what is the best way to get it right.

Now what I want to know is what the best way to do that is!

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Postby *inverse* » Thu Jul 14, 2005 3:42 pm

Earl6282 wrote:I mean... can't people be the slightest bit original?

If people are making AMVs just for attention & "stardom", then maybe - but most people I know (including myself) make AMVs for themselves. I don't care about using over-played music & anime, I just like putting my own favourite characters/scenes together with my favourite music.

But then again, I don't take AMVs seriously - too simple-minded, I guess ^^;
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Postby Castor Troy » Thu Jul 14, 2005 3:43 pm

I always thought ADV didn't have the name rights to "Rurouni Kenshin" so they renamed it "Samurai X". Of course assuming most fans can't read japanese, ADV left in the "Rurouni Kenshin" gana/kanji on the covers.
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Postby Arigatomina » Thu Jul 14, 2005 5:17 pm

When it comes to the number (and/or quality) of amvs for a popular anime, the question is always answered the moment it's posed. Why so many for a popular anime? Because it's popular. Why poor quality vids for a popular anime? Because it's popular and the more people using it, the higher the number of poor videos to it. I don't understand why this question comes up so often.

As for those poor 'great' anime that are so unappreciated...that's a fact of life. Tolstoy is great, I know that, most students know that, but I don't like his work, I don't enjoy it, I wouldn't recommend it to my friends. A million people can tell me how great an anime is, and maybe I'll understand why they think so. But if I don't like that anime, I just don't like that anime. You can't do anything about that. I like YYH, you like Lain. I'm me, you're you. Get used to it. If everyone thought Lain was a great anime, an enjoyable anime, it would be a popular anime. It's not. That may not be fair, but it doesn't change the fact that more people enjoy watching DBZ than they do Lain. That's life. Consider yourself a 'proper anime enthusiast' and leave the 'Cartoon Network' people alone. I liked YYH before it came to the US because it was an anime I like. I didn't like it because it was popular and I don't like amvs for it because it's popular. I like it because I like the anime. Popularity comes from the anime first - either you like it or you don't. If you don't, that's your problem.

Maybe the real question should be why people don't make amvs to anime they don't like. You don't have to like an anime to use it for a video, and assuming you have editing skills, those people who do like the anime will love the video. Why don't more people cater to them? Bad question. A good question is why the people who want to be catered to don't go make their own videos to those unliked/rare anime. If you want good vids to anime you like - while everyone else is making vids to anime you don't like, then maybe you should make a vid for yourself, or better yet, pay someone to make you one.

If it's a bad thing to make amvs because you want to, or because you 'can', then turn amv-making into a market. If you're not paying for it, you don't get to dictate how it's done. You can like or hate, but you have no right to demand or expect change. Buy yourself an amv-editor and pay him to make what you want, how you want it. Or better yet, find yourself a Newbie and teach him how to do it your way - free service, with you having as much control as if you'd gotten off your backside and done it yourself. You just have to find someone eager-to-please with an innate talent at editing. There are a lot of people like that here.

I wouldn't run around complaining that no one is making great vids for the genre I like, just because I'm not good enough to make them for myself. I'll do what I can and hope some like-minded individual with far superior editing skills comes around to share his vids with me. Amvs are self-service in my eyes. If no one is giving you what you want, you make it yourself or you suck it up and be happy with what you can get for free. Sure, I might get irritated at all the Inuyasha/Kagome vids (more vids for that pairing than all the YYH vids on this site) - but I'm not going to tell them to stop making IY/Kag vids and start making YYH vids. People make what they want and I think that's how it should be in a non-for-profit hobby.
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Postby dj_ultima_the_great » Thu Jul 14, 2005 5:46 pm

Arigatomina wrote:intelligent reply


You preach it, sista! :D :lol:
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Postby Kai Stromler » Thu Jul 14, 2005 6:07 pm

minor point to the OP: The Kenshin OVAs appear in 1622 videos (2%) out of the 66,000 listed, not counting the large number of RKOVA videos mislisted as Kenshin TV. This is #11 on the most-used list, making the OVAs probably the third-most overfished title in AMV, behind only the two FF games that are higher on the list.

Everything else, there's little that I can say that Ari hasn't already said and better. All I have to add is that the initial logic is a little out of whack; it is not the case that good videos will usually be recognized, but it is the case that recognized videos will usually be good. Recognition does proceed largely along lines of source popularity, but there's good stuff out there in virtually every caption if you're willing to do an exhaustive and dig it out. Do I occasionally get sick of shoveling through crap in the process of watching every metal video on the site? Of course, but it just makes it all the more rewarding when I find a video that I want to keep or shout up to other people.

With 66,000 videos, even a very rigid interpretation of Sturgeon's Law allows for a lot of good work out there. It's just that if your tastes are at variance with the general mean, you shouldn't expect to have it all delivered.

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Postby staces » Thu Jul 14, 2005 7:18 pm

dj_ultima_the_great wrote:
Arigatomina wrote:intelligent reply


You preach it, sista! :D :lol:


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Postby godix » Thu Jul 14, 2005 9:32 pm

You're forgetting sturgeon's law. 90% of anything is crap and AMVs aren't exempt from that, if anything I think the % is higher. Especially if you look at my profile.
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Postby Scintilla » Thu Jul 14, 2005 9:45 pm

godix wrote:You're forgetting sturgeon's law.

No we're not. Kai Stromler just mentioned it, two posts upthread. :P
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Postby inthesto » Thu Jul 14, 2005 10:23 pm

Three out of the three Kenshin OAV AMVs I've seen were amazingly awesome.

I will consider this a statistical anomaly, fail to read the rest of the posts, and then refer back to Sturgeon's Law.
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Postby godix » Thu Jul 14, 2005 10:25 pm

Scintilla wrote:
godix wrote:You're forgetting sturgeon's law.

No we're not. Kai Stromler just mentioned it, two posts upthread. :P

What, you mean I actually have to pay attention to what other people say before I toss out my opinion?
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Postby SuperFusion » Thu Jul 14, 2005 10:28 pm

Have posts been deleted from this thread or something because this thread has been on page 2 all day with posts coming in and it has yet to reach page 3 :|


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Postby Maovlent kaos » Thu Jul 14, 2005 10:52 pm

im new but i know wat your saying i take a while to decide on music before and animes before i pick them
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Postby Infinity Squared » Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:16 am

*inverse* wrote:
Earl6282 wrote:I mean... can't people be the slightest bit original?

If people are making AMVs just for attention & "stardom", then maybe - but most people I know (including myself) make AMVs for themselves. I don't care about using over-played music & anime, I just like putting my own favourite characters/scenes together with my favourite music.


I couldn't agree more with this. From the start I never made vids to satisfy anybody else's particular taste in videos... I make 'em purely for myself and any satisfaction I get from other people giving me adulations and congratulations is just a bonus... So whether or not that can be construed as being unoriginal by other people, quite frankly I don't care.

If I don't already have a video of something then I make it... that's it, end of story for me.

Earl6282 wrote:Hopefully I'm not offending TOO many people. It's not that I intend to, I'm simply pointing out some flaws in the whole favored-amv pattern.


But you probably have offended people, and perhaps rubbed them the wrong way at least. You did that the moment you decided you were the only person saying the right thing... though I don't disagree with you totally, it just seems to me that you need to take a chill pill :P
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Postby Pyle » Fri Jul 15, 2005 12:44 am

Holy shittt. I've finally found a person with posts longer then Arigatomina's.
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